Blenheim Palace Lodge Retreat — Hotel in West Oxfordshire

READ THEIR REVIEWS, MANY PEOPLE HAVING THE SAME PROBLEMS

Of all the places we've stayed, for a luxury lodge these aren't luxury and absolutely no thought has been put into the design of how to keep guests comfortable. In fact they've done pretty much the opposite of comfort.

There are numerous negative reviews about the same points I bring up in this review.

Mandatory check in time of 4-5pm. They're closed any other time, but check out is 10 am when you leave. Really unhelpful timing.

Bed and sofa both uncomfortable - to refuse sofa cushions is pretty much the decision of a psychopath, I just can't imagine what anyone was thinking when they thought "let's make it company policy to refuse any sort of comfort when sitting down". You basically have a big awkward bench seat to pretend to enjoy the evening on.

The bed has cheap nylon (or similar) duvet and pillows. Absolutely not luxury at all. The pillows are really uncomfortable like the sofa.

The heating situation is horrendous, air source heat pump makes hot water and heating. I can see why many people hate them in homes now.

The shower was freezing on arrival and ours went cold after minutes several times although it was intermittent.

I have never been to a hotel of any kind, no matter how expensive or cheap where it's possible to run out of hot water.

It's frankly criminal - there is nothing luxury about a very limited supply of hot water - this is a basic need for anything that advertises as luxury.

The heating was also horrendous. The whole place was either absolutely roasting at 22⁰+ or the heating didn't come on. If you try to turn the heating down just a touch at night (so you're not sleeping in a furnace) the whole system shuts down and you wake up in a freezing lodge - you can't just turn the heating back on again because air source heating is so slow to warm up it is around 4-5 hours before the lodge even begins to warm. It was so bad they had to bring us an electric heater, we were so miserably cold that morning we actually wanted to leave immediately.

You have to put up with the same temperature all day and night because there is no power in the heating system to change temperature between day and night, the heating system may be "eco friendly" but is absolutely not suitable for luxury lodges at all.

The lighting is dazzling, or off. It's like no thought was put into this at all - at a bare minimum they need dimmers as the spotlights are like helicopter search lights in your eyes, there is no soft lighting anywhere. Even a £25 a night Travelodge has several LEDs/lamps. We had to leave the oven light on just to have some light that wasn't staring us down.

The TV doesn't have Netflix or Amazon, doesn't play films and only has a few channels that actually work. Again, we've never been to a hotel where there isn't a functioning TV.

I wrote an email about the cold shower which was replied to about 18 hours later telling me that's just how their system works, giving us no solution at all.

They told us they supply electric heaters to lodges where the air source heating isn't adequate (I mean WHAT?!! This shouldn't even have to be a thing) and that it's a company policy you aren't allowed sofa cushions (despite them actually being on the room plan on their own website).

The lodges are new, clean and look good in the photos, but in terms of planning for guest comfort they've made awful decisions at every turn.

They failed to hand us a welcome letter on check in so we didn't know how to contact them for help. We also didn't know about the on site shop - we ended up driving miles for basic groceries when we could have just got stuff at our doorstep.

The staff seem polite and engaging but this is no use when the answers they give aren't solutions. To say "there's maybe enough water for two short showers" and "the heating is very slow, it doesn't have the capacity of other hotels so it'll take all day to warm the lodge" is frankly, just absurd. They've fitted completely...

We stayed in February but the lodge was warm and comfortable with modern decoration and fittings. We had a dog and so our lodge had its own fenced garden area with outdoor furniture. February meant we couldn’t sit out of course but it looks ideal for summer. The lodges are well spaced giving privacy. Although they are advertised as being in the grounds of Blenheim Palace, that wasn’t strictly so. You still have to go through the entrance to the Palace grounds to get in. There are a few free entrances around though so you don’t need to pay to walk the park areas. We don’t go on holiday to watch TV but having a dog and dark nights meant we did stay in at evening time. TV is large and modern but the Smart facility is disabled meaning channels are very limited. We have an electric vehicle and so a charger was key to our choice of accommodation. We were aware before we went that charging was trickle (3.5 KWH). We weren’t aware though that it isn’t included in the cost. Charging is by the Monta app and costs 50p a unit. You’ll need a torch to find the bar code in the dark. You need to scan it to begin. Our charger “paused” a number of times leaving us with no charge. We found the charger at reception to be more reliable and charged at 22KWH for the same cost. I asked about this and was told with a shrug that the Monta app wasn’t very good. We arrived on a Friday and weren’t able to go looking for dog friendly restaurants but found a Pizza van parks at the entrance on a Friday and Saturday evening from 5:00 pm until 8:00pm. Nearby Woodstock does have a number of pubs restaurants and takeaway places. In all we enjoyed our stay and would...

Booked a 3 night stay in a 3 bedroom cabin for a mix of adults, teenager and a baby. It was spotless and had everything we needed for self catering. The beds were excellent and the interior was as toddler safe as it could be without actual child locks. The furniture cleverly chosen to look decent while being easy to clean :-). **Please note that the cot you are able to rent from them does not come with a mattress or sheet which we only found out about when I called to confirm the booking. Not sure why it's not on their website or if it is why it's so hard to find. Hopefully they'll update that so it's absolutely clear. The grounds were lovely with a little garden and car parking space near each cabin, which were far enough away from each other for privacy. We walked to the palace one day and took the tiny train the next. We were also able to walk into the picture perfect Cotswold village of Woodstock (except on the super hot days). There are several pubs closer to the lodge if only want to do a 5 minute walk. A fairly big Tescos is 7-10 minute drive away. There's a small co-op you can walk to in about 10-15 minutes. I would absolutely stay again, it was cheaper than a lot of the Airbnb's we were looking at in and around Oxford and it was such a...